I’ve been mulling this (both frivolous and apposite) post after this song popped up on some longish car journeys over the Christmas period. Released over 40 years ago, Industrial Disease, a lesser-known track by Dire Straits, has been an absolute joy to revisit (and I’m afraid I make no apology if Mark Knopfler’s Geordie warblings are not to your taste - you’re missing out!).
Now, warning lights are flashing down at quality control
Somebody threw a spanner, they threw him in the hole
There's rumors in the loading bay and anger in the town
Somebody blew the whistle, and the walls came down
There's a meetin' in the boardroom, they're tryin' to trace the smell
There's a leakin' in the washroom, there's a sneak-in personnel
Somewhere in the corridors someone was heard to sneeze
Goodness me, could this be industrial disease?
This is all very topical - Ross Clark assures us in this week’s Spectator that the unions have lost their power (“Crisis, What Crisis?”), but tell that to those who have attempted to rely on public transport of late while grappling with the challenges of making a living, and to disadvantaged children who are about to miss even more school. The circular aspect of this particular matter sticks in the craw somewhat: as outlined in detail elsewhere, if the National Education Union hadn’t so stridently called for schools to be shut in March 2020 the situation we find ourselves might never have arisen, and we’d have the thick end of £400 billion or so available to invest in schools, teachers and other infrastructure spending. Oh.
But back to the music. Ostensibly, the song describes the British dysfunctional 1970s - a time of badly managed decline, union ‘closed shops’ and quirky working practices: the ying that preceeded Thatcher’s yang. It may sound quaint, but wokesters beware: before you impose senseless deindustrialisation and decarbonisation on us, I am assured by those that were sentient during that decade that it wasn’t much fun living through power cuts, three day weeks and energy shortages.
Caretaker was crucified for sleeping at his post
Refusing to be pacified, it's him they blame the most
Watchdog got rabies, the foreman got the fleas
Everyone concerned about industrial disease
There's panic on the switchboard, tongues in knots
Some come out in sympathy, some come out in spots
Some blame the management, some the employees
Everybody knows it's the industrial disease
The phrase itself - despite being relatively unknown in other English-speaking countries - has a host of meanings. In real English (i.e. as she is spoke) Industrial Disease means ‘economic malaise/sclerosis’, but is also a legal term for a condition or illness caused by exposure to dangerous substances or unsafe conditions in the workplace (“occupational disease” in US English).
Yeah, now the work force is disgusted, downs tools, walks
Innocence is injured, experience just talks
Everyone seeks damages, everyone agrees that
These are classic symptoms of a monetary squeeze
On ITV and BBC they talk about the curse
Philosophy is useless, theology is worse
History boils over, there's an economics freeze
Sociologists invent words that mean "industrial disease"
But I can’t help also seeing a much darker side: disease, these days, is big business. In fact, it is a huge, complex industry… an ‘Industrial Disease’, if you like. We know about the military-industrial complex, but what about the industrial-medical complex? It’s a simple prescription:
Seek, and ye shall find: diagnose via expensive diganostic, not doctor’s diagnosis.
Give it a name, then present an expensive cure.
The magic recipe gets even better if you strictly control both the miraculously fast peer-reviewed diagnostic tool and the prescribed ‘cure’: perfect for creating Industrial Disease:
Doctor Parkinson declared, "I'm not surprised to see you here
You've got smokers cough from smoking, brewer's droop from drinking beer
I don't know how you came to get the Bette Davis knees
But worst of all young man, you've got industrial disease"He wrote me a prescription, he said, "You are depressed
But I'm glad you came to see me to get this off your chest
Come back and see me later, next patient, please
Send in another victim of industrial disease"Ah! Splendid
Splendid indeed - even the Brewer’s Droop reference is appropriate given the impact on fertility…
The rest, as they say, is just business - create the market, market the product, sell the product. What could possibly go wrong?
Now, I go down to Speaker's Corner, I'm thunderstruck
They got free speech tourists, police in trucks
Two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong
There's a protest singer, he's singing a protest song
Which brings us back to today - see above: “On ITV and BBC they talk about the curse”. We’ve had plenty of catastrophisation from those veritable organs of public opinion. In fact, it was highly co-ordinated, and shrill in a way that was highly suspicious from the start. Ignoring massed peaceful marches, smearing those who spoke (and continue to speak) up, and complete crickets when it came to politically inconvenient atrocities both at home and in, for example, Australia & Canada. Plenty of police in trucks, and paramilitaries trucked in from ‘elsewhere’:
The ‘curse’ was an entirely manufactured crisis - I still cling to the vanishingly improbable hope that it was an unforced error, a big mistake, the grandest of collective delusions. But how could the scriptwriters so consciously ignore those speaking from the rational middle ground? How could they get it so wrong? To what extent is the fourth estate totally owned and involved in supporting an utterly fake construct? Who is peddling the misinformation?
He says, "They wanna have a war, keep their factories
They wanna have a war to keep us on our knees
They wanna have a war to stop us buying Japanese
They wanna have a war to stop industrial diseaseThey're pointing out the enemy to keep you deaf and blind
They wanna sap your energy, incarcerate your mind
I fully appreciate that Knopfler put these words into the mouth of a protest singer, but 40 years on these words somewhat struck a nerve:
They wanna have a war, keep their factories - tick
They wanna have a war to keep us on our knees - yup
They wanna have a war to stop us buying
JapaneseChinese - minor tweak hereThey wanna have a war to stop industrial disease - yesterday’s ‘War on Terror’ is today’s ‘War on…’
They’re pointing out the enemy to keep you deaf and blind - ‘this is an emergency, we cannot have free speech or rational thought’
They wanna sap your energy, incarcerate your mind - ‘well, if you put it like that…’
Give ya "Rule Britannia", gassy beer, page three
Two weeks in España and Sunday striptease"
Meanwhile, the first Jesus says "I'll cure it soon
Abolish Monday mornings and Friday afternoons"
The other one's out on hunger strike, he's dying by degrees
How come Jesus gets industrial disease?
Well, we’ve moved on from page 3, but even this last section strikes a chord - I can’t imagine that the real Jesus would get Industrial Disease, which makes the slammed doors of the Church of England in March 2020 (“churches will now be closed for all private prayer – including by priests”) all the more suspect: “give up your earthly worries… but don’t darken our doors, for thine especial safety”. It is hard to see how those words could have come from the true Jesus.
The rot goes deep - as discomfiting as it may be, don’t close your eyes to it. We owe it to our children to keep them from future harm. Don’t be a spectator.
In the meantime, enjoy the show.
Lyrics from https://www.markknopfler.com/discography/love-over-gold/.
I remember the 70s, was just a kid. It was grim. Candles, cold, miserable. Yeah let's not go back there 😆
Girls, Girls, Girls... https://cwspangle.substack.com/p/girls-girls-girls